MediaPost.com has the lowdown on the UFC partnering with Heavy.com to offer programming for the popular pop culture website:

Men’s media network Heavy.com has struck a content distribution partnership with the Ultimate Fighting Championship, Online Media Daily has learned. Heavy will now host a video channel containing content from the professional mixed martial arts organization’s library, including fight highlights, interviews and analyses, backstage footage and previews of upcoming fights.

All UFC videos will employ Heavy’s video ad units throughout — known as “video skins” — monetizing the video by wrapping it with a premium, high-CPM ad unit specifically designed for brand advertisers.

While UFC.com is hugely popular, it is encouraging to see the UFC in not looking at that as the sole distribution point online and source of revenues. The deal with Yahoo to sell PPV’s online is massively troubling from a journalistic viewpoint, but it is a smart for the UFC move in that they are dispersing their distribution. The Heavy.com deal has ad-based elements that will generate additional passive income. Dana white has stated in the past that he sees everythign eventually moving online, so staying aggressive in the new media realm will be key to this vision.

The deal also signals the UFC entrenching further in their 18 to 34 male demo. That is the target market for Heavy, and the UFC programming will complement the action sports programming that now plays a big role at Heavy. The UFC continues to increase its positioning with “action sports.” A similar move was made recently with the signing of the UFC to Fuel TV in Australia.